“Ill Wind” is the new mournful, opus-length dirge from DiNOLA, recently featured on the Saustex Records compilation The End is Here: The Last Label in the World Presents the Last Bands on Earth and now brought to video.
The music video was directed by Crista Rock for Big Easy Award winning band DiNOLA. The song is close to their hearts, written in memorial for beloved family member Jonah Bascle (Jonah Stands Up – PBS Documentary). Jonah was an active local community member who left behind a legacy of comedy, visual art, and disability advocacy in New Orleans. Color footage shot in the band’s rehearsal space is interwoven with B&W footage from his New Orleans Second Line Funeral parade and additional B&W stills by Autumn Spadero. This Rock n’ Roll dirge was spontaneously recorded in one take at the world renowned Rancho De La Luna studio in Joshua Tree, California and produced by Chris Goss.
Jonah, who was diagnosed with Muscular Dystrophy at the age of 12, brought light to the issue of wheelchair accessibility on the St. Charles streetcar line with his comedy and a mayoral run, and, even by sitting on the tracks, blocking streetcars in protest.
He and his family spent hours building and painting wheelchair ramps personalized to each of Jonah’s favorite bars and comedy clubs. The “Ramp It Up” project, as it was officially known, served as a precursor to Jonah’s mayoral run in 2010 on a wheelchair advocacy platform, under the slogan “I Will Stand Up For You!”
Because of its historical status, the line was not subject to the Americans with Disabilities Act, and the cars remained inaccessible to wheelchairs. Now, finally on December 1, 2020 the iconic St. Charles line streetcars will be wheelchair accessible, one day shy of the sixth anniversary of Jonah’s passing at the age of 28.